Foreign DEC

[co-joe]

We are certainly giving this industry a shakedown.

I think for those of us at Flair, what we need to remember is that everyone with a seniority number today with 2000 hours or more, will have the opportunity to be a 737 Captain within 2 years. The company has proved to me, that they are committed to internal upgrades, and hiring a few expats is not going to change that in the least.

But our plan is ambitious, our rate of expansion is unheralded, and we simply will not be able to meet all of our staffing levels without taking drastic measures. If tbaylx says that hiring a few english speaking expats will help us achieve our goals, then I trust him with my career progression. I do. He's been a team player from day one for me, he's been honest, to the point, and a no bullshit stand up guy. I don't care where he chooses to live.

Flair will continue to expand into new markets, and will continue to shake up the industry. Many WestJetters are scared, they allowed Clive to stab them in the back by creating the lowest paying 737 operator in North America, (possibly in the world) right under their noses. They are lashing out in anger because they have no scope protection in their CBA, and they are powerless to stop the cannibalisation of their routes. WestJet management will continue to take WestJet flying with Swoop, and Sunwing, and at the moment there is nothing they can do about it.

The anger here is proof that we are on the right track. Im excited to be a part of this, bring on the cool aid comments below.

[Tbayer2021]

We are certainly giving this industry a shakedown.

I think for those of us at Flair, what we need to remember is that everyone with a seniority number today with 2000 hours or more, will have the opportunity to be a 737 Captain within 2 years. The company has proved to me, that they are committed to internal upgrades, and hiring a few expats is not going to change that in the least.

But our plan is ambitious, our rate of expansion is unheralded, and we simply will not be able to meet all of our staffing levels without taking drastic measures. If tbaylx says that hiring a few english speaking expats will help us achieve our goals, then I trust him with my career progression. I do. He's been a team player from day one for me, he's been honest, to the point, and a no bullshit stand up guy. I don't care where he chooses to live.

Flair will continue to expand into new markets, and will continue to shake up the industry. Many WestJetters are scared, they allowed Clive to stab them in the back by creating the lowest paying 737 operator in North America, (possibly in the world) right under their noses. They are lashing out in anger because they have no scope protection in their CBA, and they are powerless to stop the cannibalisation of their routes. WestJet management will continue to take WestJet flying with Swoop, and Sunwing, and at the moment there is nothing they can do about it.

The anger here is proof that we are on the right track. Im excited to be a part of this, bring on the cool aid comments below.

Yup! just wait till it becomes more convenient to hire more of foreigners than locals. I wonder what tune you'll be singing then. My guess is you won't care because you'd have gotten yours by then, will keep licking that boot.

[safetyfirst123]

There's a site I've come across recently, safeflights.ca and perhaps they need to update with this latest development from Flair. Maybe Flair pilots will decide that this is a turning point for them. Hiring foreign pilots should be a last resort, only after negotiating a strong contract. It's really up to Flair pilots and ALPA to let management know their thoughts on this, and how it undermines the bargaining process.

https://safeflights.ca/index.php?page=action-status

[safetyfirst123]

There's a site I've come across recently, https://safeflights.ca and perhaps they need to update with this latest development from Flair. Maybe Flair pilots will decide that this is a turning point for them. Hiring foreign pilots should be a last resort, only after negotiating a strong contract. It's really up to Flair pilots and ALPA to let management know their thoughts on this, and how it undermines the bargaining process.

https://safeflights.ca/index.php?page=action-status

[aeronauticaldisaster]

We are certainly giving this industry a shakedown.

I think for those of us at Flair, what we need to remember is that everyone with a seniority number today with 2000 hours or more, will have the opportunity to be a 737 Captain within 2 years. The company has proved to me, that they are committed to internal upgrades, and hiring a few expats is not going to change that in the least.

But our plan is ambitious, our rate of expansion is unheralded, and we simply will not be able to meet all of our staffing levels without taking drastic measures. If tbaylx says that hiring a few english speaking expats will help us achieve our goals, then I trust him with my career progression. I do. He's been a team player from day one for me, he's been honest, to the point, and a no bullshit stand up guy. I don't care where he chooses to live.

Flair will continue to expand into new markets, and will continue to shake up the industry. Many WestJetters are scared, they allowed Clive to stab them in the back by creating the lowest paying 737 operator in North America, (possibly in the world) right under their noses. They are lashing out in anger because they have no scope protection in their CBA, and they are powerless to stop the cannibalisation of their routes. WestJet management will continue to take WestJet flying with Swoop, and Sunwing, and at the moment there is nothing they can do about it.

The anger here is proof that we are on the right track. Im excited to be a part of this, bring on the cool aid comments below.

This post is quite the pile. Everyone should read it, digest it, and realize why it should be discarded via one of the two body orifices

This is exactly why we need to ban together as a profession and establish PROPER industry rates

Divide & Conquer can be internally among a group or using another company as a boogie monster: "Many WestJetters are scared"

I remember when AC pilots were supposed to be scared of WJ pilots as they too bought into the kool-aid of grooming planes at below industry rate

Truth is, company managers are smart in knowing that pilots generally fall for the "have the opportunity to be a 737 Captain within 2 years" faster than the new 22 yrs old recently single flight attendant

Even being a Captain at Flair has abysmal rates. Outright embarrassing. If I was an industry manager, I'd be expanding all over the world too knowing Canada is the international gold standard for pilot sweat shops

One key way to massively improve pay is to ensure companies can't cop out on honoring labour supply & demand. US pilot unions fight hard against allowing in foreign pilots, increasing of the retirement age and lowering of hour experience requirements (which we don't even have)

Enough is enough. Don't be a fool. Let's demand better as a group, across company lines, and leave this profession better than what it is today

[fish4life]

We are certainly giving this industry a shakedown.

I think for those of us at Flair, what we need to remember is that everyone with a seniority number today with 2000 hours or more, will have the opportunity to be a 737 Captain within 2 years. The company has proved to me, that they are committed to internal upgrades, and hiring a few expats is not going to change that in the least.

But our plan is ambitious, our rate of expansion is unheralded, and we simply will not be able to meet all of our staffing levels without taking drastic measures. If tbaylx says that hiring a few english speaking expats will help us achieve our goals, then I trust him with my career progression. I do. He's been a team player from day one for me, he's been honest, to the point, and a no bullshit stand up guy. I don't care where he chooses to live.

Flair will continue to expand into new markets, and will continue to shake up the industry. Many WestJetters are scared, they allowed Clive to stab them in the back by creating the lowest paying 737 operator in North America, (possibly in the world) right under their noses. They are lashing out in anger because they have no scope protection in their CBA, and they are powerless to stop the cannibalisation of their routes. WestJet management will continue to take WestJet flying with Swoop, and Sunwing, and at the moment there is nothing they can do about it.

The anger here is proof that we are on the right track. Im excited to be a part of this, bring on the cool aid comments below.

Jesus open your eyes dude, Flair could still do this expansion and find Canadian pilots if they paid better which is great for you since you’d get a raise.

They aren’t looking for pilots in South Africa because they can’t find enough Canadians, they are doing it because they don’t pay enough to attract that talent.

Let’s say 1 year from now things are starting to change and the company starts really playing hardball will the SA pilots risk standing up against the company and risk losing their right to work in Canada ? No they will continue to work for sub par conditions because they are here for a passport.

[flying4dollars]

Unbelievable how many see nothing wrong with what this individual alone has done. Him and his kind have done and continue to do irreparable damage to our profession, yet we still have some jumping to their defence, I guess maybe those defending him are those who'd do the same if it were them.

When you go for a job that's being contested under scope purview and every professional association in the country is calling for an application boycott of said job, and you still chose to ignore all of that, you're damn well a scab.

And now he hides behind the technicality that what they're looking for is technically not a TFW. But the principle of why they're doing it remains the same as TFW. They need to attract qualified talent and don't want to raise wages to do so.

You personify everything that's wrong in this industry for pilots. I wish we had a similar scab list like the Americans do to this day.

You can crucify him for his choice to join Swoop in their genesis if you'd like. But when the attacks are directed at someone's choice for where they choose to reside, it just gets petty and immature and of course I'll say something about that. This isn't about defending his professional choices. How you can't see that is shocking.

[Arnie Pye]

We are certainly giving this industry a shakedown.

I think for those of us at Flair, what we need to remember is that everyone with a seniority number today with 2000 hours or more, will have the opportunity to be a 737 Captain within 2 years. The company has proved to me, that they are committed to internal upgrades, and hiring a few expats is not going to change that in the least.

But our plan is ambitious, our rate of expansion is unheralded, and we simply will not be able to meet all of our staffing levels without taking drastic measures. If tbaylx says that hiring a few english speaking expats will help us achieve our goals, then I trust him with my career progression. I do. He's been a team player from day one for me, he's been honest, to the point, and a no bullshit stand up guy. I don't care where he chooses to live.

Flair will continue to expand into new markets, and will continue to shake up the industry. Many WestJetters are scared, they allowed Clive to stab them in the back by creating the lowest paying 737 operator in North America, (possibly in the world) right under their noses. They are lashing out in anger because they have no scope protection in their CBA, and they are powerless to stop the cannibalisation of their routes. WestJet management will continue to take WestJet flying with Swoop, and Sunwing, and at the moment there is nothing they can do about it.

The anger here is proof that we are on the right track. Im excited to be a part of this, bring on the cool aid comments below.

Is this a parody account?

Flair doesn't have a recruiting problem. It has a retention problem. What is the churn at Air Canada, less than 1%? What about WestJet? Even with the chaos, are they losing 5%? Sunwing, Transit?? 5% maybe? Less?

Flair is losing over 20% of their pilots in their first year. Management was quite mum about the number of people leaving between 12-24 months. I'm guessing that this is also around 20%. Flair's employee turnover has to be 5-10X higher than any other major airline. Why is that? It has become so bad that the keeper of the seniority list won't number it any longer. If you count down the list, it's only about 12 longer than it was this time last year. For every course of 16 that we hire, the seniority list grows by 1 person. There's your problem. It's retention, not scarcity.

[ads-b]

Thanks for that post Arnie. Reinforces the theme that’s going to play out at every airline in Canada. If you want to play, you need to pay.

I’ll say this again. Time for every union in Canada to come together. Pick up your phones and call each other. Come up with pay rates and pension plan for every type of aircraft. Just like Nav Canada we now become a fixed cost. All companies can either pay or go bye bye. That includes mine.

Co-joe. Screen shot your post and save it somewhere special. In 10-20 years from now look at it. I bet you’ll have a much different viewpoint. At some point you’ll realize working the tiller doesn’t mean shit. After training for almost 2 decades I can also tell you that pilots who boast about how fast they think they’ll be upgraded are generally “average”. That’s not a slight. Just an observation.

Oh and one last point. If you think your company cares about you. Your correct. But it’s indirect. You’re a vehicle for them to make money. If they could figure out a way to not have you, you’d be sitting at home playing flight sim.

[safetyfirst123]

Flair doesn't have a recruiting problem. It has a retention problem. What is the churn at Air Canada, less than 1%? What about WestJet? Even with the chaos, are they losing 5%? Sunwing, Transit?? 5% maybe? Less?

Flair is losing over 20% of their pilots in their first year. Management was quite mum about the number of people leaving between 12-24 months. I'm guessing that this is also around 20%. Flair's employee turnover has to be 5-10X higher than any other major airline. Why is that? It has become so bad that the keeper of the seniority list won't number it any longer. If you count down the list, it's only about 12 longer than it was this time last year. For every course of 16 that we hire, the seniority list grows by 1 person. There's your problem. It's retention, not scarcity.

It is a similar story at Sunwing. The number of pilots at Sunwing has now reached what they had pre-pandemic, or roughly 450 pilots. That's after hiring a fair number of pilots in the last little while. I believe the number of resignations in the last year are around 80 or so, but I stand to be corrected. I hear Transat is losing a bunch of pilots, and Westjet alone lost over 30 pilots just last month to Air Canada.

My feeling is that the companies right now are playing a game of chicken between having to raise costs and weathering the upcoming recession. No airline wants to be the first to have to raise prices by $5 or $10 to pay their staff properly, they feel that they'll lose all their customers as a result.

This is why we need to stick together!

[co-joe]

...
Even being a Captain at Flair has abysmal rates. Outright embarrassing. If I was an industry manager, I'd be expanding all over the world too knowing Canada is the international gold standard for pilot sweat shops

...

Flair pays more than Swoop, Lynx, Jetlines, Jazz, and Encore. If you look at the upgrade potential and how that factors into the money you will actually have a shot at making, they pay more than most other options in Canada. If you're over 40, in many cases, Flair's current pay scale represents the most money you can make in Canada in your remaining usable years. The new pay scale will bridge that gap. AC will always represent a higher income potential if you are young enough to take advantage of it, but it will never compare in lifestyle IMHO.

Flair doesn't have a recruiting problem. It has a retention problem. What is the churn at Air Canada, less than 1%? What about WestJet? Even with the chaos, are they losing 5%? Sunwing, Transit?? 5% maybe? Less?

Flair is losing over 20% of their pilots in their first year. Management was quite mum about the number of people leaving between 12-24 months. I'm guessing that this is also around 20%. Flair's employee turnover has to be 5-10X higher than any other major airline. Why is that? It has become so bad that the keeper of the seniority list won't number it any longer. If you count down the list, it's only about 12 longer than it was this time last year. For every course of 16 that we hire, the seniority list grows by 1 person. There's your problem. It's retention, not scarcity.

I don't think your numbers are at all representative of what Flair's position will be moving forward. During the pandemic, Flair was the only airline on planet earth that was actively hiring pilots. We hired at least 25 pilots who were on active furlough from jobs that paid substantially more than us. Those people were rentals, nothing more. They were never going to stay no matter what we paid them. There were at least another dozen who had already done interviews for jobs that paid more and were just biding their time till the better offer came down. Then there were the expats who were just waiting for their call back to make 30k a month in the sandbox.

I think your numbers were drastically scewed by rental pilots who were never going to stay at flair no matter what happened once their jobs came back. The reality moving forward will depend largely on the new CBA, and what happens when China comes back to life.

[Canadaflyer46]

...
Even being a Captain at Flair has abysmal rates. Outright embarrassing. If I was an industry manager, I'd be expanding all over the world too knowing Canada is the international gold standard for pilot sweat shops

...

Flair pays more than Swoop, Lynx, Jetlines, Jazz, and Encore. If you look at the upgrade potential and how that factors into the money you will actually have a shot at making, they pay more than most other options in Canada. If you're over 40, in many cases, Flair's current pay scale represents the most money you can make in Canada in your remaining usable years. The new pay scale will bridge that gap. AC will always represent a higher income potential if you are young enough to take advantage of it, but it will never compare in lifestyle IMHO.

Flair doesn't have a recruiting problem. It has a retention problem. What is the churn at Air Canada, less than 1%? What about WestJet? Even with the chaos, are they losing 5%? Sunwing, Transit?? 5% maybe? Less?

Flair is losing over 20% of their pilots in their first year. Management was quite mum about the number of people leaving between 12-24 months. I'm guessing that this is also around 20%. Flair's employee turnover has to be 5-10X higher than any other major airline. Why is that? It has become so bad that the keeper of the seniority list won't number it any longer. If you count down the list, it's only about 12 longer than it was this time last year. For every course of 16 that we hire, the seniority list grows by 1 person. There's your problem. It's retention, not scarcity.

I don't think your numbers are at all representative of what Flair's position will be moving forward. During the pandemic, Flair was the only airline on planet earth that was actively hiring pilots. We hired at least 25 pilots who were on active furlough from jobs that paid substantially more than us. Those people were rentals, nothing more. They were never going to stay no matter what we paid them. There were at least another dozen who had already done interviews for jobs that paid more and were just biding their time till the better offer came down. Then there were the expats who were just waiting for their call back to make 30k a month in the sandbox.

I think your numbers were drastically scewed by rental pilots who were never going to stay at flair no matter what happened once their jobs came back. The reality moving forward will depend largely on the new CBA, and what happens when China comes back to life.

Hate to break this to you but Jazz and Encore are regionals flying Dash 8s, and Jetlines has 1 plane. So you're really having to scrape the barrel for comparisons in how substandard the pay is at Flair. I honestly don't know how you're not furious at their plan to ship pilots in from the other side of the world just to keep the payscales so low.

[daedalusx]

I honestly don't know how you're not furious at their plan to ship pilots in from the other side of the world just to keep the payscales so low.

He got his 30 pieces of silver. Why would he be furious?

[Joe Blow Schmo]

In case you missed it we are involved in contract negotiations to do exactly that. Regardless of the pay stealing pilots from other companies is a bandaid solution and moves the problem to another carrier and does little to address the underlying issue of not enough experienced 705 pilots in Canada to support the growth currently occurring.

Perhaps a recession will come along and temporarily fix that problem but Flair is not going to wait to see what happens. We'd prefer to address it by becoming a competitive career airline in Canada and at the same time increase the number of experienced pilots in the country as well as pursue outreach programs that involve getting more young Canadians to pursue an aviation career.

Immigrating a few pilots to Canada is not going to fix the issue at an industry level. It requires a multi-pronged approach and decades of work.

There are plenty of experienced Canadian 705 pilots overseas who would happily return to Canada for a decent salary. Of course they're currently making double or triple what you pay with a lower tax burden.

One can earn USD150K (CDN200K) flying a narrow body jet in India, Indonesia, the Philippines, Africa, etc. I'm sure you'll appreciate that if you want to attract experienced Canadian pilots you'll have to, at the very least, match the pay in the developing world.

[Arnie Pye]

...
Even being a Captain at Flair has abysmal rates. Outright embarrassing. If I was an industry manager, I'd be expanding all over the world too knowing Canada is the international gold standard for pilot sweat shops

...

Flair pays more than Swoop, Lynx, Jetlines, Jazz, and Encore. If you look at the upgrade potential and how that factors into the money you will actually have a shot at making, they pay more than most other options in Canada. If you're over 40, in many cases, Flair's current pay scale represents the most money you can make in Canada in your remaining usable years. The new pay scale will bridge that gap. AC will always represent a higher income potential if you are young enough to take advantage of it, but it will never compare in lifestyle IMHO.

Flair doesn't have a recruiting problem. It has a retention problem. What is the churn at Air Canada, less than 1%? What about WestJet? Even with the chaos, are they losing 5%? Sunwing, Transit?? 5% maybe? Less?

Flair is losing over 20% of their pilots in their first year. Management was quite mum about the number of people leaving between 12-24 months. I'm guessing that this is also around 20%. Flair's employee turnover has to be 5-10X higher than any other major airline. Why is that? It has become so bad that the keeper of the seniority list won't number it any longer. If you count down the list, it's only about 12 longer than it was this time last year. For every course of 16 that we hire, the seniority list grows by 1 person. There's your problem. It's retention, not scarcity.

I don't think your numbers are at all representative of what Flair's position will be moving forward. During the pandemic, Flair was the only airline on planet earth that was actively hiring pilots. We hired at least 25 pilots who were on active furlough from jobs that paid substantially more than us. Those people were rentals, nothing more. They were never going to stay no matter what we paid them. There were at least another dozen who had already done interviews for jobs that paid more and were just biding their time till the better offer came down. Then there were the expats who were just waiting for their call back to make 30k a month in the sandbox.

I think your numbers were drastically scewed by rental pilots who were never going to stay at flair no matter what happened once their jobs came back. The reality moving forward will depend largely on the new CBA, and what happens when China comes back to life.

Flair might pay more than Swoop. Lynx has an accelerator clause which will pay 10% more than Flair when the new contract comes out. Jetlines only has one airplane and isn't hiring. Jazz and Encore aren't a comparators as they are primarily domestic feeder routes with smaller aircraft.

Upgrade potential doesn't mean S#*% unless you're a 2000 hour pilot living in your mom's basement. Any of these companies will upgrade you once you meet Captain minimums.

If you're over 40, you'll still make way more money at Air Canada and Transat over the remaining 25 years of your career. Flair just had a couple of guys in their 50's head to AC from here and they only applied within the last couple of months. You won't make 777 Captain at AC but you'll retire mid-seniority narrow body captain.
You might not make more money at Westjet with a long upgrade time.
I don't have enough time and energy to run the numbers right now but here are some basic AC numbers:
Air Canada is 3.5 years to upgrade where you'll earn a base salary of about $185k [actually, I think it is higher since you carry years of service and enter as a year 3 captain??] plus pension matching, Nav pay etc. As a Captain, you'll easily clear over $200k without doing stupid amounts of overtime.

Flair is only $114k base for year one Captain [then 120k and 123k and no years of service]. The retirement package is 3.5% so you can expect to get a whole $166 per pay to retire on.

Those two jobs are largely the same. 737, domestic narrow body Captain working what ever your seniority can hold. Every single FO that I can think of (and nearly every Captain) would go there in a heartbeat if offered a position. The retention package isn't even a thought on the way out the door. It might as well be a gift card to purchase Flair swag.

I'm not paying today's bills with tomorrow's promises so Flair's position in the future is largely irrelevant. Maybe we will get a better contract; maybe we won't. Maybe one day we might get that shiny new travel policy that was announced 6 months ago. MAYBE the schedule will be released on time two months in a row.

We have NOT HIRED ANY rental pilots in the previous twelve months. We did have quite a few in the first year after expansion began. Any of them who didn't have a full BS bucket went back within the first year or so. Retention has been a problem all through the year and got to the point where Flair offered a retention package that won't effectively retain anyone. Too little money, too far in the future.

Mark my words, a year from now if we don't have a substantial increase in WAWCON, we will be looking at another 20% churn in 2023.

This is a retention problem; not a recruiting problem.

[homesick]

What a sad place to be for Canadian pilots.

I've said it before and I'll say it again, there too many Canadian expats, including me, who would love to come back home.

But the wages are not even close to international standards which makes it the only deterrent for many to make a move.

I shake my head in disbelief that there are pilots who think this is an acceptable course of action which will lead to any improvements in the long or short term of the working conditions.

[Tbayer2021]

I can't remember who it was, but someone here used the term to describe Canadian pilots as "subservient machismo". The more I thought about that the more it perfectly described a large part of the pilot population here.

[SPR]

Those people were rentals, nothing more.

"Rentals"? How goddamn demeaning. No wonder they were in a rush to leave when they were being treated like "rentals" instead of "employees". Also, nothing is guaranteed, and I bet they could have been convinced to stay if the WAWCON made it worth their while. The fatalism in assuming that pilots are going to leave no matter what, so why bother trying to retain them, has led to two of my previous employers crashing and burning after I left because they couldn't staff their operation.

[Gameon]

In principle it’s not great to bring in foreign pilots. No doubt. That’s said look at how many countries are having to look abroad. The US is an example. I don’t see the numbers making much of a difference. It’ll take well into late next year for the process to even have any benefit to Flair. In the meantime they certainly have a retention issue. The pay rates will have to increase substantially to make it a place a pilot can call home and establish roots. They’ve had some senior ( and I use that term loosely ) leave for AC and other better paying jobs with more secure futures. The retention bonus is a nice idea and well appreciated I’m sure but it won’t stop the bleeding. The Flairs board need to decide if they want an airline of choice or a stepping stone training airline for AC. We shall see.

[flying4dollars]

Those people were rentals, nothing more.

"Rentals"? How goddamn demeaning. No wonder they were in a rush to leave when they were being treated like "rentals" instead of "employees". Also, nothing is guaranteed, and I bet they could have been convinced to stay if the WAWCON made it worth their while. The fatalism in assuming that pilots are going to leave no matter what, so why bother trying to retain them, has led to two of my previous employers crashing and burning after I left because they couldn't staff their operation.

No, that was somewhat accurate. Many were Sunwing/overseas guys who lost their jobs in the pandemic and came to Flair because they were the only ones hiring at the time. Most of those had every intention of going back to their respective jobs once they were called back. Flair knew what it was and the ones that had 737 time were given a 'short course'.

So no, not demeaning and not why they were in a rush to leave.